Brevard Pagan Meetings Official Moderation Policy

The most important thing to keep in mind as a moderator on BPM is the goal we hope to achieve through moderation. This is simple: BPM is moderated for the express purpose of providing a welcoming and safe environment for local Pagans to network and share ideas, and is at all times to be considered an extension of the Tuesday Night Meet-Ups, also sponsored by Space Coast Pagans.

As you moderate posts and e-mails on the board, please keep this foremost in your mind. Ask yourself if your choices will help to achieve the above goal or if they will in fact negate it. This is possible when we choose to be too permissive or too strict in our enforcement of the following moderation policy. Consistent application of the posting guidelines is necessary to achieve the moderation goals.

Your primary responsibility as a moderator on BPM is to approve or reject messages submitted by members of the board. Messages should be rejected if they violate any of the following posting guidelines, and it is up to you to decide whether or not they do. If the post does not meet our guidelines send a brief, polite, message to the sender when you reject it explaining why you felt it did not meet the posting guidelines. It is important to be clear about why the post is not acceptable in your rejection message and to include the specific guideline/s that the message is in violation of. If you feel it is appropriate you may include some friendly suggestions on how the post might be improved so that it can be put on the board if it is submitted again. After rejecting the post, please send a brief e-mail to Space_Coast_Pagans_CCandA@yahoogroups.com stating which posting guideline the post failed to meet and the name/e-mail of the poster. If possible you may copy the text of the rejected post and your rejecting notice into the e-mail to the SCP Council(Space_Coast_Pagans_CCandA@yahoogroups.com).

Do not edit the post so that it does not violate the posting guidelines, allow the original poster to make any and all changes. The reason for this is simple: if you edit a post to BPM you take responsibility for the contents of that post. The only time that you may edit the contents of the post is to remove excessive quoting from the end of a post provided it is not referenced in the text of the current one.

Do not delete a post unless it is spam.

All you have to do when a post meets all the following guidelines is approve it!

• Language or subject matter inappropriate for minors or a family setting.
• Personal attacks on other posters, community members or any grouping of the previous. It is completely acceptable to debate and question another’s ideas, but attacks on the person/s are not allowed.
• Insults or rude remarks about the beliefs, spirituality, religion, path and the actions taken for the above. Again: debate on these issues is good, but insulting remarks regarding them are unacceptable.
• Encouragement or advocacy of illegal acts of any kind.
• Purely commercial posts. You may add the information to the links section or to the database section in the form of “Local Pagan Friendly Businesses” if you feel it is appropriate.
• E-mail forwards and chain letters.
• Re-posts or forwards of the entire text of a webpage. In these cases you may ask the poster to send a link to the page in question or to re-phrase the information in their own words.
• Multiple posts of the same content/e-mail.
• Information about events, political causes and other endeavors in opposition to the interests of the Pagan community.
• Messages regarding events, political and charitable causes that may be of interest to the Pagan community but are written in a manner which is insulting or prejudiced towards the Pagan community.
• Information about local Pagan events that do not contain the name (or a recognizable abbreviation of the organization’s name) in the subject line of the message. This includes but is not limited to posts discussing future or past events. Some members of the list only attend certain group’s events, and like to delete messages concerning other groups activities without reading them.
• The personal information of anyone other than the person posting the message, including their legal name, phone number, street address, place of work, physical description or other personally identifiable information.

Any questions or suggestions regarding the BPM Moderation Policy, it’s wording, practice or enforcement should be directed to the SCP Council(Space_Coast_Pagans_CCandA@yahoogroups.com) or the Chair of either the PR or Events Committee.